Two Plus Two Equals Five
by Kiryn
Summary: The words echoed around in his head, but all he could hear was, "I care about Sirius more than you."


**A/N: An awful thing has happened. I have been and will be internet deprived this entire weekend. I have resorted to sitting in a Quiznos in a desperate attempt to get some WiFi. This fic was last night's attempt for me to cope with internet withdrawal. Since my apartment apparently won't be getting the internet back until Monday, it is entirely possible that you'll be seeing another fic tomorrow. I tried to write some more of "An Enchanted Moment", or any of my chaptered stories, but this didn't work at all, because I was far too jittery to focus properly. The symptoms of said withdrawal could be the possible explanation of why this fic is so weird. And why I continue my trend of Harry Potter angst. **

**A note to keep in mind while reading: 4 is, in fact, the Chinese number of death. Just so you know, but it didn't make sense for Peter to state this within the story. I thought it would take readers out of the story. **

**Pairings: James/Lily, Remus/Sirius, hints of Peter/James. **

**Warnings: Character deaths, possibly disturbing thoughts, and, of course, slash. But no swearing, as amazing as that might seem. **

**Disclaimer: Absolutely no portion of the Harry Potter franchise can be affiliated with me. All characters and etc belong to JK Rowling. I'm just a poor, pitiful person trying to cope with internet withdrawal. I do own this title, for once. **

Two Plus Two Equals Five

Sirius Black was special.

It was why Peter hated him.

Peter was, in every depressing sense of the word, average. He was born to middle class parents, neither poor nor rich. His parents were not cruel ones by any means, but neither were they especially cool; they were alright, as parents went. Peter wasn't hideous looking, but only his mother would ever call him handsome. He was rather more intelligent than the average person, but the difference seemed miniscule in the company of his infinitely more brilliant friends, who were all so _clever_, so _funny_, so _handsome_, so _creative and ingenious_. Even Remus, the closet werewolf. But not Peter. He likened himself to being the invisible Marauder.

Average.

How he loathed that word.

Peter knew that he was luckier than most average people had any right to be. He was in the company of the Hogwarts' equivalent to the famous, and, in James's and Sirius's cases, the rich. And they were truly the best friends that anyone could ever have, even Sirius. Anyone in the world would have loved to be in Peter's shoes, except for perhaps the Slytherins like Snape. Remus was a brilliant source of homework help, and in his absence it was fairly easy to talk James and Sirius around into helping. No Maraudering was done without Peter being consulted, and he was always informed of trips to the kitchens and secret (illegal) Hogsmeade visits. By becoming an Animagus, he had been allowed to see a part of Remus's life that only James and Sirius had also seen, the part he would never be able to share with anyone else.

They were the Marauders. He had thought that they were supposed to be equals. But that was the lie. Peter knew that there was no such thing as equality. There were invisible lines that he couldn't cross.

And Sirius was the one who drew those lines.

The first one had been drawn out around James. It was easy to make James laugh, but any sense of accomplishment Peter might have felt vanished once he remembered that James always laughed the hardest at Sirius's jokes. Sirius was the first person James would turn to whenever a new idea occurred to him, Sirius was the first person James had shown his prized invisibility cloak to, Sirius was the first person he would go to whenever Evans shot him down, Sirius was the first person he would ask to come over to his house to visit, and, in answering absolutely _any_ question about his friends, James always said Sirius's name first.

They were all James's friends. But it was only Sirius who was his _best_ friend, his _brother in all but blood_.

Peter had never thought it was fair that Sirius got to be special again while he was left being average, but he had learned to accept it. He never seemed to be able to silence the voice that whispered in the darkest recesses of his mind, but he had convinced himself that Sirius didn't really mean to be so stingy and draw lines around James that kept everyone else out. He couldn't help being—Peter supposed the word was _needy_. Sirius couldn't help being a bit needy.

But Peter hadn't seen the lines Sirius had been drawing around Remus until it was too late.

With James, it seemed like the line was a circle, with no ending and no beginning. It was just something that always was: There was a line around James, and only Sirius had the innate ability to cross it. Its existence wasn't intentional by the involved parties. It was another aspect of life to be accepted and coordinated around: the sun was affixed to the sky, they had magic in their blood, Dumbledore was addicted to lemon drops, and Sirius was James's best friend. Peter could deal with all that.

But the line around Remus was deliberate; a flame coaxed from an initial spark.

And it shut Peter out in a way that he had never thought that he could be shut out from a boy. It wasn't that he thought that what Sirius and Remus did was wrong. He had just never imagined that a boy would want to hold hands with another boy, touch another boy, or _kiss_ another boy. He had always been told that boys liked to kiss girls, and that was that. But no, now Peter knew that only _average_ boys like him would be content to do such a common, normal, _average_ thing and kiss girls. Peter doubted that _Sirius_ had ever been average a day in his life.

Sirius had been born the heir to a dynasty, a family amongst the wealthiest of the _purebloods_, named after the brightest star in the sky.

Sirius must have been doted upon in early childhood by his parents. He was their heir. But Sirius had thrown that away himself and made his parents despise him, but that was okay because James's parents and Remus's parents and even Peter's own parents loved him enough to more than make up for it.

Sirius had a little brother who had looked up to him for absolutely everything, but when that brother had been lost to him, it didn't really matter because he had _James_ to be his brother. Peter had always wanted a little sibling.

Sirius was brilliant and gifted with his magic, and had a photographic memory, which meant that he didn't have to study to be amongst the top students in their year.

Sirius was _beautiful_ and had the kind of body and face that inspired artists and made them declare him their muse, an _angel_.

Sirius was charismatic, and the kind of person you could never truly bring yourself to hate, because if you were being honest with yourself, you knew that you wanted him to be your friend.

Sirius was _special_, and he kissed boys like Remus, who was also special, the only werewolf to have ever gotten a formal, proper education. And Peter was sure that he hated Sirius.

James was average.

Oh, he wasn't as average as Peter. James was plenty special sometimes. But James was still born into a pureblood family that was very wealthy, and yet definitely not the richest and the Potters certainly were not counted alongside high society purebloods like the Blacks, blood traitors as they were. James was clever and powerful, but he didn't have a photographic memory like Sirius and studied a tiny bit more. James was handsome enough, depending on one's taste, but he would never be called beautiful like Sirius, not with the wildly tangled bush he had for hair and his crooked glasses. Sirius had always been elegant and beautiful in the time that Peter had known him, but James had definitely gone through an awkward acne and all elbows-and-knees phase.

James was special sometimes, but mostly he was rather more average.

And James didn't kiss boys—he kissed girls. He was average; like Peter.

Peter was almost pretty sure that he loved James.

But, aggravatingly so—_Sirius was still James's best friend_.

The Marauders had always most definitely been a group of four. Peter liked four. Four was a good number, easily divisible. And at first, it had always been James and Sirius, and Remus and Peter. He had been a little jealous, but he had been content with that. But now Sirius had paired off with Remus, and they weren't even Sirius and Remus, but rather SiriusandRemus. A couple. Two halves that had been joined at long last to make the whole.

And so, Peter had thought, that the logic should follow, that if it was now Sirius and Remus, then shouldn't it now also be James and Peter? Or even, dare he think about it, to follow the logic further, shouldn't it really be SiriusandRemus and JamesandPeter?

Peter was average, but he wanted to be special. And he was pretty sure that that desire itself was an average one—why _wouldn't_ a person long to be special? And so, surely, _James_ wanted to be special. Peter couldn't be James's best friend—he still couldn't cross Sirius's line—but maybe they could help each other become special.

Only average boys kissed girls.

But Peter would never understand James. Because James apparently didn't want to be special. James wanted to be average.

It became SiriusandRemus and JamesandLily. And Peter.

* * *

Peter noticed that James's eyes had a lot of light in them. They were nice eyes. But he had also started seeing the special lights that would enter his eyes, new lights that would only kindle when they rested upon certain people.

There was a special light in his eyes when he looked at Lily, pure love and devotion, and sometimes desire. The light in his eyes when he looked at Harry, his son, was something that went even deeper than love, tinged with wonder and awe. There was a light when he looked at Sirius, bone deep steadiness that was yet mingled with mischief and adventure. There was a light special for Remus, an instinctual sense of protectiveness with an innate calm and level-headedness that only Remus could provide. Dumbledore inspired a kind of serenity in everyone, often mixed with overwhelming relief—there was now someone to take the weight of the world on his shoulders.

But no special light entered James's eyes when he looked at Peter.

Sitting on the couch across from the chair Peter was seated in, one hand was clenched into a tense fist on his knee, the fingers of the other entwined tightly with Lily's. There was worry in those eyes, anxiety, and a fear that almost on the verge of turning into panic. And, the other emotions almost clouding it out of sight, there was a degree of expectation in them. It hadn't occurred to him that Peter would even think of saying no. Because they were the Marauders. Unconditional was a mantra in their code, in their honor.

Peter was uncomfortable in this house. He hated to give the Death Eaters any reason to think that he might be able to discover more valuable information. He didn't want to be a spy, he hated lying to his friends, whom, despite everything, he would always care about. He hated the word his poisonous subconscious would whisper to him: _traitor_.

But he didn't want to die, either.

James was talking.

"Would you do it, Peter? Would you be our Secret-Keeper?"

"M-me?" Peter wondered if he had ever been more terrified in his life. And elated at the same time. "W-w-why _me_?"

"Because you're my friend, Peter." _But still not your _best_ friend, right, James?_ "I know I could trust you with anything." _But not with your son's life or happiness, apparently. You made Sirius his godfather, not me_. "And Sirius is too obvious of a choice. This way will be perfect. You'll be the real Secret-Keeper, but everything will think that it's Sirius. He'll be the decoy—they'll all target him, but you, the real one, will be safe, and so we'll be safe."

The words echoed around in his head, but all he could hear was _I care about Sirius more than you._

Peter wanted to throw up. He wondered if James knew about the skull-shaped blight that marred the skin on his left forearm. Because James was making it so that _Sirius _would be safe, and it was now _Peter _being thrown into a venomous snake pit. He would never be able to keep something of this magnitude from the Dark Lord. Even if he declined, the Dark Lord would still know that James had offered and he'd refused, and then he'd be killed.

James was saving Sirius, not Peter.

_Sirius, Sirius, Sirius, Sirius, Sirius, Sirius, Sirius, Sirius, Sirius, Sirius, Sirius._ Everything was always about Sirius. He was special, after all. And Peter was _so sick_ of it.

His fingers twitched violently on the arm of the chair before he managed to school them into stillness. He thought he saw a brief flash of green and eyes that might have followed the movement.

Peter summoned a weak smile. "Of course, James. I'd be honored."

* * *

He hadn't been a Marauder, invisible as he might have been, for nothing. A plan was forming quickly in his head as he stared at the man with rapidly approaching strides across a crowded, daylight drenched street, murder in his gray eyes, an unreality flickering in the air between them. Because it was unreal that they had come to this, one seeking to murder the other, unreal that James was dead but an infant still alive.

Four, Peter decided, was an apt number for death.

Everything had always been about Sirius. He was the type that people were destined to remember. Everyone would remember Sirius and forget Peter, because Sirius was special and Peter was average. He would make sure of it.

James and Lily were already dead, and now, Peter thinks, he and Sirius would be joining them. Remus could be the leftover this time.

And for the first time in his life, Peter feels special, awash in magic as he triggers his transformation, Sirius's mad cackles and the screams of the Muggles the background music, a dirge of triumph.


End file.
